turtle. The thing was big enough to have snapped off Michael’s thumb with no effort. One of the neighbors wanted to get a gun and shoot it, but Michael and his father got it back into the pond with no harm done. “LOOK OUT FOR THE . . .” Winters could be tough in Cherry Hill. One day the streets were solid sheets of ice. Frank, who was fourteen or fifteen at the time, had managed to make it to the bus stop across the street from our house and was waiting for the school bus when someone shouted that the schools were closed because of the weather. Frank started back home, he crossed the street and was almost home when he slipped, slid into the curb and cracked his collar bone. His screams were horrendous. No one could touch him he was in such pain. We called our family doctor, who lived on the same block. Dr. Boguslaw left his house and immediately slipped on the ice. When he got to Frank there was nothing he could do but send him to the emergency room at a nearby clinic. Herman drove Frank to the clinic but even they couldn’t do much more for him than to put his arm in a sling. When they left the clinic Herman care- fully inched his way around the car to get Frank safely in the car. Then he tried inching his way to the driver’s side but again the ice won. Herman fell and cracked his elbow. The two walking wounded decided to have
breakfast at a popular restaurant in the area called Ponzio’s. When they sat down to eat the waitress was rubbing her head and complaining about fall- ing and hitting it that morning on the way to work. She had heard there were a hundred people in the emergency waiting room that morning. SHOOSTERS IN SLINGS Meanwhile I am anxiously waiting to hear about Frank so Herman calls from the restaurant and tells me that Frank has a broken clavicle but is okay and that he has also fallen and had hurt his elbow. How bad he didn’t know. When they got home it was obvious we needed to go back to the clinic and get Herman patched up. Now both Herman and Frank had their arms in slings. What we didn’t know at the time was that while all this was going on Nana Dora had tried to light her gas stove in the kitchen and a small explosion had injured her arm. It was in a sling. Somehow three generations of Shoosters had managed to get their arms into slings in a single day. To make matters worse we decided not to tell Dora about the injuries to Herman and Frank because she was so easily upset if anything happened to them. However, Dora was also used to seeing them on a regular basis and when they didn’t appear she was upset because they seemed not to care that she was injured. It wouldn’t be a secret long since Frank called
Selma Denneburg
Dorothy in the Kitchen at Cherry Hill, N.J.
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